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Species of Equus
Pre-War Pony-Kind Before the war, Equestrian society, and society before the Founding, was primarily dominated by three species of Pony: Earth Ponies, Pegasi, and Unicorns. A millennia after the Founding, the first Alicorns were revealed to Equestria. As time went on, new species had evolved from the first three: the Thestrals, cursed night-cousins of the Pegasi; and the Crystal Ponies, the tundra-hardened cousins of the Earth Ponies. Earth Pony Pegasi Unicorn Alicorn Crystal Pony Thestrals Sub-Species Breezies The Breezies are a rare and unique species in Equestria, protected by the Equestrian Society for the Preservation of Rare Creatures. They are small, equine-shaped creatures that share many traits with insects, and in the eyes of several paleoentomologists, physical traits with both Flutterponies and Changelings. Some more radical paleoentomologists believe that the Breezies are in fact an off-shoot of the Flutterponies, having evolved into a smaller form in order to survive whatever potential catastrophic event that could have potentially led to the evolution (or devolution, depending on how you view the prehistoric relationships of Changelings and Flutterponies). Seaponies Not much are known about the Seaponies, seeing has how they have yet to have been encountered by modern-Equestrian society. What little is known, though, is that they are an off-shoot of the Breezies who had lost their wings due to genetic mutation or manipulation, and later evolved to live in an aquatic environment. Changelings What is known about the Changelings primarily stems from the major conflict had with the species with Chrysalis' failed invasion of Canterlot during the Royal Wedding of Princess Mi Amore Cadenza and then-Captain Shining Armor. However, in the years following this event, and preceeding the Great War, agents of the Ministry of Historical Preservation made it their goal to understand Changeling society more. What has been learned from this research has helped shape a much clearer image of this race, as well as painting a better understanding of why the invasion occurred. Flutterpony What little was known about Flutterponies was lost long before the Great War. A few facts, or rather, myths, have been passed down the generations in both Equestrian and Changeling societies. Flutterponies have been long-believed to be the ancestors to the Changelings, producing emotion instead of consuming it. However, seeing as how no known Flutterpony exists in the present day world, this myth cannot be confirmed or denied by the Ministry of Historical Preservation. Pre-War Non-Pony Species Gryphon Canine Deer Zebra Antelope Buffalo Camel Tapir Boar Minotaur Ibex Pre-War Non-Sentient Species/Creatures Phoenix Parasprite Bats Domesticated Animals Pigs Rabbits Gators Ursa Ursa Minor Ursa Major Post-War Pony-Kind Alicorn (Post War) Ghoul Ghouls are the byproduct of ponies being exposed to large amounts of ionizing radiation, most of which has come from the detonation of thousands, possibly tens of thousands, of Balefire Bombs and Thermonuclear Megaspells. Much of the internal organ structure of the Ghouls are nearly identical to their Pre-War pony/zebra counterparts, however, there are certain notable differences. The muscular structure of the Ghouls, in comparison to the Pre-War equines, is a lot more compact and dense. This smaller muscular frame allows the Ghoul to be more agile and able to get into tighter locations and maneuver gracefully around prey. The next notable difference is quite obvious. The epidermis of the Ghouls, or the skin, is drastically different than their Pre-War counterparts. The epidermis is much thicker and more rugged, suggesting that it is better made to resist the increasingly dangerous environment that is the Equestrian Wasteland. The skin can be best described as leathery, much like that of an elephant or rhinoceros... however, not as thick. Even though the skin is more durable and the muscles are much more compact and dense, the smaller body frames and frail forms leave much to be desired in terms of defense. A simple .32 round from a horribly under-powered .32 revolver can penetrate both the skin and muscle of the body. In some instances, a well-placed shot from any firearm is quite capable of removing entire limbs, even going as far as completely exploding the head off the Ghoul. The final, notable difference between Ghouls and their Pre-War counterparts... is the state of their brains. During the initial moments of Ghoulification, the process by which one becomes a Ghoul, the brain undergoes a morphological change at the cellular level. It, by reasons unexplained by those who consider themselves experts in the Post-War world, somehow ties the consciousness of the Ghoul in question to the state of decay of their neural tissue. For example, a Ghoul can live for two hundred years, so long as they continued to believe that they were indeed still a living creature capable of conscious thought and rational behavior, in effect, making the Ghoul immune to death by old age, as long as sufficient food and radiation was available for them to sustain themselves with. However, there in lies the proverbial "other shoe". Because of this new-found immortality, Ghouls are faced with not only have to overcome their personal and cultural loses, but also come to terms with their own lack of mortality at the hooves of time. Ghouls who are incapable of processing or accepting this inevitability find themselves unable or unwilling to continue life as they are... instead, thanks to the adverse effects of the ionizing radiation, the Ghoul's brain degrades rapidly, until the Ghoul is reduced to nothing more than an empty shell of their former self... effectively giving in to animalistic instincts and becoming feral. Feral Ghoul A Feral Ghoul is physiologically identical to a normal Ghoul with one notable exception: the brain of the Feral Ghoul has devolved into a gelatinous mess of goop inside their head, reducing the social behavior of the Ghoul to that of pure animalistic instinct. Feral Ghouls, due to the degradation of their brains, lack many of the bodily systems that Ghouls and their Pre-War counterparts have, many of which deal with the sustainment of muscle mass and prevent the decomposition of the epidermis and internal organs. Most Feral Ghouls survive in the Post-War world for 50-70 years, depending on abundance of food, radiation, and lack of enemies. However, several cases have been reported of sealed buildings and facilities having populations of Feral Ghouls that have been around since the end of the Great War, such as in High Tower Prison or the Ministry of Wartime Technology hub in Canterlot. Glowing One The Glowing One is a unique variant of Ghouls and Feral Ghouls that have been exposed to much, much more radiation over the course of longer periods of time. Predicting genetic mutation caused by ionizing radiation is inherently impossible, due to the fact that even in a controlled environment, two events that have the exact same parameters are incapable of having identical results. The exact amount of radiation required to turn a Ghoul into a Glowing One is incalculable, both in sheer quantity of ionizing radiation required and unknown pre-determined genetic markers in each and every individual Ghoul. Glowing Ones are named such due to the fact that, due to the large amount of radiation in their bodies, they simply radiate ionizing radiation and glow an eerie green. The excess radiation given off by the Glowing Ones, when in groups with other Ghouls, can heal any damage the other Ghouls may have sustained, even to the point of regrowing limbs in some cases. Canterlot Ghoul Canterlot Ghouls are Ghouls who have absorbed the Pink Cloud, a byproduct of a specific Megaspell Talisman designed by the zebras. They are fused to whatever armor or clothing they were wearing at the time of exposure and Ghoulification. Due to this fusion with the Pink Cloud, Canterlot Ghouls are appropriately named due to the fact that they reside in only the once-beautiful capital of Canterlot. Balefire (Flaming) Ghoul Balefire Ghouls, like Canterlot Ghouls, are Ghouls who have absorbed the traits of a zebra talisman. But, unlike Canterlot Ghouls, Balefire Ghouls have taken on the abilities and powers of a Balefire Talisman. Glowing a bright blue, due to the thaumaturmagical flames, Balefire Ghouls radiate both extreme radiation and heat. Balefire Ghouls, like Dragons, can exhale powerful blasts of fire, easily melting reinforced steel and concrete barriers with their atomic fire breath. Bloated Ghoul Bloated Ghouls are a terrifyingly deadly variant of Ghouls, primarily existing as only Feral Ghouls. Very few Bloated Ghouls maintain their sentience and consciousness, but are incapable of maintaining social proprieties and niceties, due to the thirst for blood and growth of it's species. Unlike other versions of Ghouls, Bloated Ghouls do not require massive amounts of radiation to increase their number. In fact, ponies and Ghouls only need be exposed to specially mutated Flood Spores in order to be converted into Bloated Ghouls. The current Head-of-State of the Ministry of Historical Preservation, Administrator Marble Stonewood, has cited that the Bloated Ghouls, Bloated Feral Ghouls, and Bloated Glowing Ones of the Seaddle Ruins are not only a subspecies of the Ghouls, but also a subspecies of the Flood. Ghost Blanks Post-War Non-Pony Species Hellhound Brahmin Post-War Non-Sentient Species/Creatures Balefire Phoenix Bloatsprite Bloodwing Radhog Radbit Radroach Radigator Starspawn Radscorpion Nightstalker Scorposprite Post-War Abominations Chimera Floater Hospital Horror Smooze Wall Choir Extinct Species Celestials : Main Article: Celestials Hailing from an unknown world, the Celestials were the second species to settle in the land known today as Equestria, the first being the Ancients. The Celestials rivaled the Ancients technologically, but were superior (in their eyes) in the areas of government and economic security. The cities of Cloudsdale and Canterlot, once (and still) thought to have been built by the Pegasi and Unicorns respectively, were actually initially concieved and prototyped thousands of years ago by the Celestials. The Celestial Military housed many installations across the planet, including a research facility on the planet's northern-most pole. Sadly, the Celestials were forced to leave Equestria when a plague, manufactured by renegades in their own ranks, began sweeping across the planet. The surviving Celestials made their way to the Omega Galaxy, where they began to grow and multiply, preparing for the day when they could return home. Again, fate was not on their side, when an enemy they thought was defeated returned, causing them to build a weapon that could stop it. The weapon they created, however, was consumed by the parasitic enemy and turned against them, forcing the Celestials to wipe the slate clean in the galaxy, wiping both them and their creation out of existence. Great seeding machines constructed decades prior to the Mass Extinction repopulated the galaxy with life, ensuring the survival of sentient life in the Omega Galaxy. Ancients : Main Article: Ancients Born from the fires of a planet they called Celestis, the Ancients were forced to flee their homeworld under the threat of religious persecution by their former allies, the Ori. They first made their presence known again in the universe in the Milky Way Galaxy, making their first colonoies on worlds such as Dakara and Earth. However, the desire for more materials to continue their research and expansion forced them to expand to another galaxy, which led the space-faring species to the Avalon Galaxy and to the land now-called Equestria. Soon after their arrival though, the Celestials, another space-faring species, landed in a nearby area. Initial relations between the two groups were peaceful, until the Ancients began accusing the Celestials of stealing their technology. Even after being assured that their technology wasn't being stolen, the Ancients began sending spies into the ranks of the Celestials, even going as far as to brain-wash commanding generals and lead researchers in the Celestial government. Upon discovery, the Ancients were issued an ultimatum: cease all infiltration action or risk open war. The Ancients took this as a threat, and made a preemptive strike against a Celestial cruiser, sparking the Trans-Galactic War. The two sides fought the costly war for many generations, the causes of the war being forgotten by those who were in command, until both sides were engaged by a common enemy. After defeating this common enemy, the two sides came to the negotiating table and brokered a shaky treaty between the two empires. The treaty, however, wouldn't last long, as a plague released by Celestial renegades swept across the planet, wiping out both Ancient and Celestials alike, forcing both species to abandon the planet altogether. Returning to the Milky Way, the Ancients inadvertently brought the plague with them. Being ill-equipped to protect themselves, the Ancients fled the Milky Way Galaxy for another galaxy entirely, a galaxy they would once-again flee to return back to Earth, where they would become one with the population of humans and equines there, their bloodline dying out after millions of years of dominance. The Flood (O-17A) : Main Article: The Flood The Flood, or more commonly referred to as the Parasite in Celestial Records, are a species that fluctuates between extinct and abundant, depending on the period of time in which it is encountered. The first absolute encounter with the Flood in recorded history was around 1.27 million years ago by the Celestials on an unclassified planet. The encounter was considered by Celestial Military Command to be of grave tactical error on the part of the commanding officer overseeing the operation, General Iron Fury. As a result of the failed mission, the Flood was able to not only gain control of multiple Celestial ships, but also form a Proto-Gravemind out of the many corpses of Celestial officers, the primary conduit being General Fury herself. Since this encounter, the Celestials have been devising weapons to combat the expansion of the Flood, devolving from a sole focus on energy-based conventional weapons to projectile, focusing heavily on scattershot firearms. This unexpected change in the tactics of the Celestials put the Flood on the defensive, forcing them to consolidate their strength on the unclassified world, hereafter referred to as the Primal World. It is from this Primal World that the Flood stretched forth out into the Wild Space of the Universe, traversing the Great Void to spread their spores across numerous star systems outside the Avalon Galaxy, reaching as far as even the Milky Way. The Flood encountered numerous great civilizations through this explosion of expansion, including the Forerunner and the Ancients. While the Forerunner made it their goal to wipe out the Flood, the Ancients used their superior technology to outrun them, fleeing an unnamed galaxy altogether. The last recorded encounter with the Flood is roughly 128,000 years ago on the planet of Equus. Near the end of a thousand-year war between the Celestials and the Ancients, the Flood had arrived. The Celestials, having remembered their ages-old enemy, began deploying more adequate weaponry to combat them. The Ancients, however, continued to use their conventional energy-based weaponry. Both civilizations realized that fighting an all-out war against the Flood wasn't going to work, so in a secret council, two avenues for victory were presented. Either they wipe out all life on the planet, or they create a machine similar to the Flood. The Celestials all but jumped at the chance to create a synthetic lifeform, and with the Ancients knowledge in such matters (due to their experience creating the Asurans), the Aesorans were born. It took several decades of hard fighting with little advancement, but eventually the deployment of the Aesorans had beaten back the Flood, consuming the parasitic lifeform and turning it into synthetic machines. Since then, the Flood has yet to be encountered by any space-faring civilization. But it is only a matter of time until the Flood reveal themselves once again. Aesorans (O-17B) : Main Article: Aesorans Ultrices : Main Article: Ultrices